Let me give the short story first. I have a couple tomato cuttings in
a mason jar of tap water. I fertilized two days later with a weak KNO3
and (NH4)2SO4. They began producing roots. After about three weeks,
the roots were several inches long. Then I changed the water to one
with a weak wash from Vigoro's Citrus & Avocado food. Within a few
days, there was substantial root dieback plus dead spots on the all but
the youngest leaves. I rinsed the stems and put them back in plain tap
water. Now, two days later, the dieback seems to have stopped. Anyone
have experience getting sucker's such as these going again? I'd really
like to get them rooted then finally transplant to soil. Keeping this
line going is also an objective.

The details are as follows: In March I took a couple cuttings, top 3
to 6 inches of suckers from a tomato plant that had been very
productive in August thru early October. The plant had over wintered
outside (tomatos are grown commerically in "choice parts" of southern
Calif. year around). My tomato patch is not one of the "choice parts."
We are located on the North side of a hill. In April thru October it's
OK. By November, my tomato plants start getting mildewed, blossoms fall
off, if they haven't open they hang with no visible development. Fruit
that hasn't ripened by mid-November also stops developing. So usually
I turn off the water and pull my plants about mid November. This year,
altho I stopped wateromg as usual, I was busy with other things and
left one plant in the ground thru February - the only water it got was
rain. But we had a very wet year here, I suppose the rain kept these
shoots alive since the base of the plant was not much more than a husk.

I cut the surviving shoots (two, 1 six inches, the other about 2.5
inches), put them in a quart jar (foil wrapped) of tap water. They sat
there for about 2 weeks without wilting but also without rooting. Then
I added a several onion seed sized crystals of pottassium nitrate and
one ammonium sulfate crystal the size of a radish seed. A few days
later I finally had some roots and the foloiage had greened up a bit.
That was the good news.

Then I went shopping for Chelated micros with no results. After finding
my best source closed (a stall at the Carlsbad Flower Exchange), I
visited several of the retail garden centers. Finally, at the local
Armstrongs Nsy, I saw some fertilizer advertised as "complete with
minors" at a relatively decent price, 12$ for 40 lbs (18 kilos). It
was a Vigoro product labeled "for citrus and avocados." What really
caught my eye were the "complete with minors": Magnesium 1.5%, Sulfur
9.2%, Boron 0.02%, water soluble copper 0.01%, water soluble iron
0.001%, water soluble manganese 0.01%, molybdenum 0.0005%, water
soluble zinc 0.01%. (The majors we 6.5 % N from some ammonium salt,
3.5 % N from a slow release coated urea, available p2o5 4%, soluble
k2o 10%.)

I had the idea that a pinch of this might be just what these cuttings
needed (the other 9.99.. lbs hopefully will be good for our Nectarine
and Peach trees). I took roughly 0.1 grams of it, dumped it into a cup
of water and tested by taking a tsp (20ml?) and adding it to the mason
jar with the cuttings. Bad idea! The next time I looked in, several
days later, the root tips were dieing and there are lots of dead or
dying spots in the leaves, especially the older leaves. I immediately
changed the solution back to tap water. Today, two days later, they
are still living. One of the cuttings, the smaller one, had about 80%
dieback of the roots, stumps about 1 mm to 1.5 mm remain but there also
appears to be a new bump of new root starting to grow. The roots of
the other cutting are much better, many filamentous roots an inch or
two long still remain.

Any ideas on what I should do next? This Vigoro product is not
homogeneous. Also, doesn't the water soluble Copper looks high
relative to the other micros? Thank you very much - Bob in Calif.

Janet Baraclough wrote:
The message .com
from "Bob" contains these words:

Any ideas on what I should do next?

Yes. But it would be off-topic in a gardening group.

Janet

not if it involved propogation! (;-)

pk

In article .com,
says...
Let me give the short story first.
(snip short? story containing a chemistry students thesis)

Are you really going to eat these tomatoes?

Can I come and watch?

pb - They were very tasty last September - October. And lots of them
with good size etc. etc.
The blossom bud on one cutting might be a bit stale as its been
vegetating there since last November.
You're welcome to come look but it does look a lot like a high school
biology experiment.
Janet - It's good to see you still remember what your mommie taught you
- if you can't say something nice ...

I am sorry to sound rude,but what are you going on about!So you took two
cuttings,they rooted why the hell would you want to fertilize them at this
stage.Once they have rooted well,pot them up let them get on with growing
then when they are at the flowering stage start fertilizing with a high
potash feed,i.e. tomato feed.
I don't get what all the fuss is over ,for two tom plants!
It surely shouldn't be made to be that much trouble!

--
Thanks Keith,England,UK.
"Bob" wrote in message
oups.com...
Let me give the short story first. I have a couple tomato cuttings in
a mason jar of tap water. I fertilized two days later with a weak KNO3
and (NH4)2SO4. They began producing roots. After about three weeks,
the roots were several inches long. Then I changed the water to one
with a weak wash from Vigoro's Citrus & Avocado food. Within a few
days, there was substantial root dieback plus dead spots on the all but
the youngest leaves. I rinsed the stems and put them back in plain tap
water. Now, two days later, the dieback seems to have stopped. Anyone
have experience getting sucker's such as these going again? I'd really
like to get them rooted then finally transplant to soil. Keeping this
line going is also an objective.

The details are as follows: In March I took a couple cuttings, top 3
to 6 inches of suckers from a tomato plant that had been very
productive in August thru early October. The plant had over wintered
outside (tomatos are grown commerically in "choice parts" of southern
Calif. year around). My tomato patch is not one of the "choice parts."
We are located on the North side of a hill. In April thru October it's
OK. By November, my tomato plants start getting mildewed, blossoms fall
off, if they haven't open they hang with no visible development. Fruit
that hasn't ripened by mid-November also stops developing. So usually
I turn off the water and pull my plants about mid November. This year,
altho I stopped wateromg as usual, I was busy with other things and
left one plant in the ground thru February - the only water it got was
rain. But we had a very wet year here, I suppose the rain kept these
shoots alive since the base of the plant was not much more than a husk.

I cut the surviving shoots (two, 1 six inches, the other about 2.5
inches), put them in a quart jar (foil wrapped) of tap water. They sat
there for about 2 weeks without wilting but also without rooting. Then
I added a several onion seed sized crystals of pottassium nitrate and
one ammonium sulfate crystal the size of a radish seed. A few days
later I finally had some roots and the foloiage had greened up a bit.
That was the good news.

Then I went shopping for Chelated micros with no results. After finding
my best source closed (a stall at the Carlsbad Flower Exchange), I
visited several of the retail garden centers. Finally, at the local
Armstrongs Nsy, I saw some fertilizer advertised as "complete with
minors" at a relatively decent price, 12$ for 40 lbs (18 kilos). It
was a Vigoro product labeled "for citrus and avocados." What really
caught my eye were the "complete with minors": Magnesium 1.5%, Sulfur
9.2%, Boron 0.02%, water soluble copper 0.01%, water soluble iron
0.001%, water soluble manganese 0.01%, molybdenum 0.0005%, water
soluble zinc 0.01%. (The majors we 6.5 % N from some ammonium salt,
3.5 % N from a slow release coated urea, available p2o5 4%, soluble
k2o 10%.)

I had the idea that a pinch of this might be just what these cuttings
needed (the other 9.99.. lbs hopefully will be good for our Nectarine
and Peach trees). I took roughly 0.1 grams of it, dumped it into a cup
of water and tested by taking a tsp (20ml?) and adding it to the mason
jar with the cuttings. Bad idea! The next time I looked in, several
days later, the root tips were dieing and there are lots of dead or
dying spots in the leaves, especially the older leaves. I immediately
changed the solution back to tap water. Today, two days later, they
are still living. One of the cuttings, the smaller one, had about 80%
dieback of the roots, stumps about 1 mm to 1.5 mm remain but there also
appears to be a new bump of new root starting to grow. The roots of
the other cutting are much better, many filamentous roots an inch or
two long still remain.

Any ideas on what I should do next? This Vigoro product is not
homogeneous. Also, doesn't the water soluble Copper looks high
relative to the other micros? Thank you very much - Bob in Calif.

...you took two cuttings,they rooted
at the point I added a bit of ammonium sulfate and saltpeter they
had not rooted and the leaves were looking beat up.. Inspection
showed they were not rotting. I am aware that in general one doesn't
fertilize when trying to root

why the hell would you want to fertilize them at this
stage?
That was very dilute fertilization -- and the results prove it
didn't hurt and more than likely, it helped the root growth

Once they have rooted well,pot them up let them get on with growing
then when they are at the flowering stage start fertilizing with a
high
potash feed,i.e. tomato feed.
I don't get what all the fuss is over ,for two tom plants!
It surely shouldn't be made to be that much trouble
It's been my experience that few people know that tomatos can be
propagated by cuttings and fewer yet, myself included, have a
good idea of how to go about it.
I have heard long and often that, as a rule, roots developed in a
solution,
such as by hydroponics, are somehow different than roots developed
in soil and that water roots will rapidly rot when put in soil.
I know of some exceptions, Ipomoea species for example,
but I don't know how it is with tomatos. Have you actually done
this?

Thank you, Bob

"keith ;-)" wrote in message
...
I am sorry to sound rude,but what are you going on about!So you took two
cuttings,they rooted why the hell would you want to fertilize them at this
stage.Once they have rooted well,pot them up let them get on with growing
then when they are at the flowering stage start fertilizing with a high
potash feed,i.e. tomato feed.
I don't get what all the fuss is over ,for two tom plants!
It surely shouldn't be made to be that much trouble!

There's no telling what those merkins will do. Odd lot they are. I mean,
they even post gobbledegook to U.K. newsgroups.

"Janet Baraclough" wrote in message
...
The message .com
from "Bob" contains these words:

Any ideas on what I should do next?

Yes. But it would be off-topic in a gardening group.

Oohhh, that is naughty!

--
alan

reply to alan(dot)holmes27(at)virgin(dot)net

In case some poor soul stumbles on this instead of some of the other
fine reports on the web.
Further research (on the web) shows tomato cuttings root easily - with
tap water or weak rooting solution. Sounds like the rooting hormones
give you more roots but whether the difference is worth the trouble
appears to depend on your circumstances9 are you in a rush? not in a
rush, quality of tap water, etc.). Reports of using only tap water,
reported 14 days for good roots.
Roots developed in water, according to several reports, transplant into
soil very nicely. Some people report that its almost difficult to get
a cutting not to root! One can bury an unrooted cutting, in the right
circumstances, and it will still root nicely.

Here are two links that worked for me:
http://groups-beta.google.com/group/...95dd ca6e1ad4

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/...ac73 168c2787

As you can probably see, I just searched the newsgroups via google for
"tomato cuttings" ...

Happy Gardening

In article .com, Bob
writes
You're welcome to come look but it does look a lot like a high school
biology experiment.

Being polite might I enquire just why you are going to so much trouble
and why you didn't actually just shove the cuttings into gritty compost
and leave them?
Why are these tomato plants so valuable that you have to go to such
extreme measures to keep them going? Aren't the seeds any good? If you
are growing things on such a 'scientific' scale why not grow the plants
in isolation and use the seed from the resulting fruit.

Janet

--
Janet Tweedy
Dalmatian Telegraph
http://www.lancedal.demon.co.uk